Big J

I wouldn't use two different powerheads on a double ended mill. Double ended milling is extremely stressful on all the mechanical components (and the users!) and any mismatch will likely result in early failure. Double ended milling works very well on shorter bars, and is an extremely rapid way of producing a decent volume of sawn timber (and sawdust). However, the bar flex on bars over 60" is unacceptable, and again strains the chain, drive sprocket, bearings and everything else. Here is the largest log we ever did with the double ended mill: I'm 6ft 8", for reference.

I'd be extremely surprised if you get any interest. It's a damned shame, but no one wants beech. If ever I take it, it's usually oversized and I rarely ever pay for it.

Sod the kids. Eat the sweets yourself.

It hasn't really rained for four weeks here, and the easterlies bring incredibly low humidity too. Shame, as it's a beautiful spot.

It's a damning indictment of this country when we see a van as beautifully kitted out as that and just think about how long it would take to get emptied out by low lifes. It must be nice to live somewhere where that isn't a concern.

We're in the milling forum chaps. Kim is asking about how it mills. Hate the stuff with a passion. Covers the blade in resin, rarely cuts true, springs all over the place when you try to cut dimensional timber out of it, covers you in sap and those tiny little splinters and it's difficult to get decent quality saw logs. Much, much prefer cedar and that's what I offer my customers when I can.

No. It's not entirely ideal long term. It's a collection of old farm buildings and the layout is fiddly. If I were to buy a site it would be blank so as I could start from scratch.

25 minutes from the centre of Edinburgh, 0.9 acre yard (hardcored, though mostly by me) total including about 700 square metres of sheds and barns in varying states of disrepair. A not particularly beefy three phase supply and I've done a lot of work to the site myself. Just a smidge over a grand a month.

Can we please dispense with the teenager from the hood language? "Have you bought another Corsa van Mark?" Corrected.

Don't rate Vauxhalls at all. Cheaply built. Also object to Corsas on the grounds that the only way I'd fit into one is with a double leg amputation.

It's so quick that you need at least one person just taking away crates and reloading the deck. It's the selling it that takes the time!

As a hobbyist firewood producer (most of my firewood ends up being burnt by me, the chaps that work for me or friends, though we use a fair bit) with a fairly quick processor, I have enough time on the machine to compare hardwoods versus softwood and I've concluded that I will never, ever buy hardwood for the purpose of firewood again. Rattled off a 40 cube order for a friend, and had the choice of 25-35cm straight, 3.7m larch (too good for firewood really, but strongly dislike milling larch and it ended up in my yard as payment for a job) and some very loosely definable processor grade hardwood (plane, whitebeam, ash, lime, cherry). I would say that yes, most of it would physically fit through a processor, but it was bendy. So cutting to a largish spec (35cm logs) we found that we were struggling to do 2 cube an hour. The plane is hellishly difficult to split, and the processor would occasionally jam, even with 25 tonnes of splitting force. The larch however was a total joy to split. No jams, all splitting done on the 8 way and it took under 5 minutes to do a cube. 14 minutes for a 3.3 CM crate to be precise. So appreciating that all things weren't equal (very straight, perfect sized softwood versus not ideal, but not awful hardwood), how much slower do folk find cutting hardwood is? And do you find it damages the machine more? I certainly feel that the hardwood risks more breakages.

John, can you tell me - would you describe it as codwood?

Nuts! I'd have taken it. Love poplar - the perfect compromise between hardwood and softwood (in my opinion) and the friends that had some also really liked it. Dries quickly, puts down a reasonable bed of embers and usually lights just from newspaper.

No comment on the topic, but I have to point out that the thread should read: Having too many qualifications. Grammar nazi out!

A Citroen Berlingo would do the trick. No sense in going for a used one with them being so cheap new. The ex demostrator or pre registered vehicles are even cheaper still. Should do around 70mpg. I like Citroen and would always recommend them.

Regardless of how the customer wants to have the job done, commercial forestry practices should still inform the final process. In the same way that you wouldn't let your customer tell you how to dismantle a tree, I'd be careful to ensure that they understand that the reason best forestry practice exists is because it's tried and tested. If you don't have the correct equipment for best extraction, I'd suggest that you either contract it in, buy it yourself, or pass the job onto someone who does. For minimal impact extraction, I'd suggest calling Mark Council (very local to you) with his Alstor 8x8 forwarder. This still represents a fairly expensive way to bring the timber to roadside (about £10 a tonne) but it's a lot more sensible that some of the options explored so far. If you want a qualified forester specialising in continuous cover to give you a quick opinion as to what is best to do with the woodland, please get in touch with Ben Clinch at Moray Estates. He might have a free hour to meet you on site, give you his two pence, and he does really know his stuff. I do honestly feel that if you do the job according the customers exact specification, with the equipment that you have and with the methods you've described, you'll give yourself an awful job that will never end, with an unhappy customer at the end and be doing softwood forestry professionals locally no favours in terms of general reputation.

I would walk away Andy. First thinning properly managed softwood is not much fun unless you are a) a sado masochist or b) very, very skilled at it. It's brutal hard work where the start of the fell is severing it at the butt and then a lot of a winching usually follows. Very few clean fells. Now the stand you are talking about sounds overdrawn and densely packed. I've worked in a stand like that (only once, never again) and it was purgatory. The customer should be able to break even if they rack thin it (and as John says, use the matrix for other trees - something I don't know a great deal about, I should stress) but I think that the job will end up taking far longer than you think and costing your customer a fortune. Not to be unkind, but you'd not stick a squad of sitka cutters in to sectionally dismantle an elm, and perhaps it's not the wisest thing to stick specialist tree surgeons in to thin softwood plantation.

That's high. I'm £35/t delivered in for semi dry softwood for firewood.

What's the difference between an egg and a Star Wars fan? An egg gets laid.

THE GYNAECOLOGIST WHO BECAME A MECHANIC A gynecologist had become fed up with malpractice insurance and HMO paperwork, and was burned out. Hoping to try another career where skilful hands would be beneficial, he decided to become a mechanic. He went to the local technical college, signed up for evening classes, attended diligently, and learned all he could. When the time of the practical exam approached, the gynaecologist prepared carefully for weeks, and completed the exam with tremendous skill. When the results came back, he was surprised to find that he had obtained a score of 150%. Fearing an error, he called the Instructor, saying, "I don't want to appear ungrateful for such an outstanding result, but I wonder if there is an error in the grade?" The instructor said, "During the exam, you took the engine apart perfectly, which was worth 50% of the total mark. You put the engine back together again perfectly, which is also worth 50% of the mark." ............ After a pause, the instructor added, "I gave you an extra 50% because you did it all through the exhaust pipe, which I've never seen done in my entire career".

I didn't start until last August, always thinking that it was faffy and complicated. In actual fact (provided you aren't fishing at extreme distance) it's much simpler, and the presentation of bait and effectiveness of striking is much improved. I love close range fishing, and being able to sneak a float and bait into a tiny nook in a near side (or indeed far side) margin is deadly. With the trout fishery, because it's deep close in there is no need to fish distance and the short (but entirely elasticated) pole comes into it's own. The turnaround time for hooking and unhooking small fish and then putting the bait back in is incredibly short and the 3m of elastic (which will stretch to over 20m if required) will handle much larger fish quite easily. Playing a fish on the pole (especially when equipped with a puller kit, so you can increase or decrease the pull on the elastic) is great fun. Highly recommended!

Had a great day at the local trout fishery on the short (3.3 or 3.6m) pole yesterday after the roach. Ended up with 585 small roach for about 14lb, as well as 9 trout (mostly rainbows, but a couple of smaller browns to just under 4lb). Also had three small pike to 8lb, as they tend to hit the keep nets and a deadbait fished a couple of foot from the net quickly gets a take. After nearly 600 fish yesterday I was shattered when I got home!

There is unfortunately no such thing as a good all round machine. It will always be a compromise. We've four forklifts, all different and all in regular use. One is a telehandler with a log grab on the fork carriage, one is a 4x4 forklift with a bucket for shoveling logs and sawdust, one's a compact counterbalance for tight areas of the yard and barns and one's a monster counterbalance with knobblier tyres for lifting 5 tonne logs easily. The point is that whilst four machines is perhaps overkill, if one breaks down, you've always got back up. We've had as many as two break down on one day and we need a minimum of two to work. The time you save switching over implements and also not using a machine that is unsuited to a job easily justifies the expense of purchasing the machines and maintaining them. I should stress all four machines cost just over £20k, so not breaking the bank.

Anywhere from £25 to over £1000 a tonne depending on quality. Without photos it's impossible to tell!